This month 37 Parkside Avenue in Southampton – the HGA House – received LEED Platinum certification with a sizable 104 points. Sadly to say, it was built after David and Saundra Dubin’s original home was destroyed in a fire a couple years ago. The green home is nicely done, traditional, and wired up with all sorts of green gadgetry, perhaps showing folks in the jumbo luxury market what it takes to secure LEED Platinum certification.

Rebecca Guymon and Joe Turner are the owners of Breezeway House – the first certified Passive House in Utah and in the western United States. They’re unique because only a handful of these ultra-insulated, airtight, low-energy homes exist in the United States. So I asked Turner to share his experience building and living in a Passive House and he was kind enough to respond. This is mandatory reading for anyone interested in owning a Passive House.

This self-sufficient home took a 2010 Evergreen Award from Eco-structure in the Greenhouse category and features some impressive, green elements. Built in Houston for owners Daniel and Adele Hedges, the home – referred to as Virginia Point – is net-zero energy, near net-zero water, and the first home in Houston to receive LEED Platinum certification.

KB Home announced the completion of four energy-efficient homes in the Springwood community in the City of Roseville, California. What’s noteworthy, you might agree, is the fact that they’re the first in the nation to receive the WaterSense label. And KB Home intends to complete every home in the community to the same standard, making it the first in the country to do so.

Blu Homes recently installed and completed this factory-built home for two professors in Long Island. It’s based on the Element line, which is basically the same model used to build this Rhode Island retreat that we mentioned previously. Maura McCarthy, co-founder of Blu Homes, told me in an email that steel frame construction helped the permitting process because the site is in a 120 mph wind zone near the ocean.

You probably heard about the new Passive House Alliance and the election of Sam Hagerman, Hammer & Hand, as president of the alliance. This company is behind some impressive green projects, including an interesting home renovation in Portland. Zack Semke, Director of Evangelism and Evolution at Hammer & Hand, said Twin Studios tells a “unique Portland story of micro-community-renewal and ‘upcycling’ of a marginal structure into a beautiful, low-impact, green duplex.”